Since HFD began publishing at the start of 2003, we have been delighted to be able to report consistently good news in the war on cancer. Only a couple of months ago, we noted a two-year decline in cancer deaths in the US. But a WHO agency brings the sobering reminder that the good news […]

Death from cancer has declined for two straight years in the US. Whether the trend continues may depend on finding cures or preventives for prostate cancer, which could go through the roof as the baby-boomers age, but a glance through this issue of the Digest reveals a raft of genetic and pharmaceutical advances in the […]

A pundit envisions a market-driven healthcare heaven by the year 2020, in which all patients are perfect capitalist consumers with perfect knowledge, perfect discrimination, and perfect ability to pay. A healthcare heaven may well be within reach technologically by 2020; but this will be beyond anybody’s grasp, politically and socially. A handful of visionary US […]

Some of us think that the acceleration of healthcare innovation is not being taken seriously enough. But what does it mean to take it seriously? What is one supposed to do? It has always been the mission of the Digest to highlight practical and pragmatic responses to acceleration, and your humble editor’s role at the […]

British Telecom’s “futurologist” told the BBC recently: “. . . using common sense you can discount the ideas, like internet fridges, which are never going to take off.” Also not taking off, according to the BBC reporter, are flying cars — another “outlandish prediction.” If intelligent fridges and flying cars are not batty enough for […]

When CNN produces the headline: “Medical advances not science fiction,” it just might be true. They include, of course, advances in the war on cancer, which is being won, and that’s not science fiction, either. Throughout this issue, such rumblings of revolution in healthcare are louder than ever. CNN Takes Notice Source article Discoveries of […]

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With New Orleans seemingly in its death throes, Kashmir in seismic shambles, central America buried in mud, a global flu pandemic on the way, Iraq disintegrating, Bali bombed again, not to mention more decent Americans joining the millions reduced to living in poverty and lacking access to care, it’s hard not to get despondent. Most […]

Looking for that special viral or bacterial genome — one that doesn’t even exist? All the equipment and support services you need to make one in your garage is available (used, but cheap) on eBay and other Internet sites. Sequence your Own: Expect to see a machine on the market by early 2007 that will […]

Remixing: From Consumers to Producers The recent Emerging Technology Conference in San Diego revealed “an increasingly commonplace process: people using cheap and accessible digital tools to ‘remix’ the world around them,” said a Newsweek reporter. “It used to be that when you wanted something, you went and made it. Then we turned into a bunch […]